TAMPA BAY, Fla. — First, she feared for her sister in Puerto Rico. But on Thursday, this Florida woman became the one preparing for a hurricane.
"Thank God everything is fine. They dodged a bullet," Nilsa Henry, a restaurant owner in Tampa, Florida, said.
Puerto Rico is still recovering from Hurricanes Irma and Maria.
The bullet may have missed Henry's sister and her nieces in Puerto Rico, but the tides may have turned for her family.
"I was worried. I even called her yesterday. I said because, 'it’s going up there,' " Zaida Garcia, Henry’s sister, said during a video interview from Puerto Rico.
"We have some sandbags here, right back there from the last hurricane and we gonna put them around (the backdoor of the restaurant)," Henry said. "When it rains a lot, water goes into the kitchen."
So, she plans to wait out the storm at her house. She was making a checklist Thursday afternoon.
"I’m buying tape to tape the windows, water, bread, crackers, bacon," Henry said.
Jeff Aziz, a Tampa resident, already picked up his supplies from a Home Depot.
"I picked up just some beverages, some tarps, some ratchet straps, fasteners; got some plywood and additional 2x4 material to add to my own personal inventory," Aziz said.
Like Henry, Aziz also planned to stay during the storm — at least for the time being.
"It all depends on where the path is gonna go. We’ll just watch it for the next couple days and make a decision by Saturday," Aziz said. "I mean my house is 75 years old and as much as I think I’ve braced it, I am concerned it may not be able to sustain more than a Cat 2 or Cat 3."
This story was originally published by Darren Botelho on WFTS.